Undastandableplain-English hub

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See how your representative actually voted.

Type your address. You get all three of the people who represent you in Congress — your House member and both senators — the real bills they voted on, how each one voted, and where their campaign money comes from. Every vote links to the official government record.

Your full street address — that is what it takes to identify your House member. A ZIP code alone can only find your two senators, because ZIP codes cross district lines.

Your address is not put in the web address. It is sent once to the U.S. Census Bureau to find your district, and to our server only if that lookup fails. We never save the address itself — if our server does the lookup, it keeps only the district result, for up to 7 days, filed under a scrambled code.

Only want your senators? Skip the address →

What happens next

  1. 1

    You see all three. Your House member and both of your senators, by name.

  2. 2

    You see what the vote was about. Written in plain English, not bill-speak.

  3. 3

    You see how they voted. Yes, no, present, or did not vote.

  4. 4

    You see where their money comes from. Campaign funding broken into plain buckets — individuals, PACs, party committees, their own money.

  5. 5

    You can check it yourself. Every vote links to the official House or Senate record. You never have to take our word for it.

What this is, and what it isn't

The honest limits. A ZIP code is not proof of a House district — some ZIPs cross district lines — so the full address is what pins down your House member. Give a ZIP alone and you will get your senators and a "possible district" it refuses to guess at.

The roll-call records are a packaged snapshot, and the page shows the date it runs through. A vote cast after that date will not appear yet — that is the snapshot being out of date, not your representative sitting one out.

Where this came from. Undastandable explains things people are expected to already understand — money, power, health, technology — in plain English, with the sources shown.

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